The Life and Works of Edgar Allan Poe

Summary: Discusses how writer Edgar Allan Poe's life affected his work. Describes the many unfortunate events and hardships in his life. Considers how many of his darkest tales show evidence that his life experiences influenced their dreariness.

Throughout the life of Edgar Allan Poe, he suffered many unfortunate events and endured several difficult situations. Some speculate that it was these experiences that helped to formulate the famous writing style of Edgar Allan Poe. His dark tales such as "The Masque of the Red Death" and "The Tell-Tale Heart" are horrific, and his poems such as "Alone" and "The Raven" show evidence that his life experiences influenced their dreariness. Poe's story plots and his own life are undeniably related and this relationship is intricately defined in many of his works.

Poe lived in poverty all of his life, never seeing enough money from his writings to allow him to live comfortably, and never seeing his writing arrive at the famed status that it has today. Poe drank heavily throughout his life due to all of the downfalls he suffered. In...